The Reluctant Rancher. Leigh Riker

paused. “The bruises were just the start. I don’t want you to end up the same.”

      Now it was Blossom who blinked. “Well. Thank you for your concern.”

      As if no one else had ever cared about her.

      Exasperated, Logan planted both hands on his hips. Heedless of his warning, she had slipped her hand through the bars to pet Cyclone’s neck. The colt all but purred like a cat. “He has a lot of promise but no common sense,” Logan said.

      “He’s like the bison baby. He’ll never learn to be gentle if he’s...”

      “Mistreated?” The word had just popped into his head.

      “Punished.”

      “You’ve got to be kidding. I’m the bad guy here?”

      He turned away. And nearly tripped over the tortoiseshell kitten. How had she gotten out of the tack room?

      He eyed Blossom. “You again?”

      “I was looking for you. I heard her crying. So I let her out.”

      Logan picked up the cat, who instantly nestled into the crook of his neck. “Just so you know. I didn’t touch that calf except to help him. I’d never touch this horse in anger.”

      “They won’t respond to threats either.”

      “Ah,” Logan muttered. “I see. You decided to work on this ranch, so you stopped at some bookstore on the way and bought a copy of The Horse Whisperer. Or The Cat Whisperer. No, there’s probably a Bison Whisperer, too.” Putting the kitten down, he gave Blossom a pointed look. “I have news for you. Sometimes—like when you’re about to get kicked—that touchy-feely stuff doesn’t work, city girl.”

      Still shaken from his near brush with serious injury, he tried to stare her down. Finally, she glanced away, her gaze following the kitten as she meandered down the barn aisle. From the bend of Blossom’s slender neck, he realized she must consider herself akin to the bison calf. Mistreated. Was that the expression he kept seeing in her eyes?

      He knew little about her. He wanted it to stay that way.

      The kitten disappeared around the corner, probably headed for a hay bale and a nap. And Blossom was gazing past Logan, out the barn doors. She stared at the long driveway, as she often did.

      “You’re right,” she said. “I’m sorry I put you in danger. I am a city girl.”

      He tried to lighten the moment. “Let me guess. New York? Boston?”

      “Philly,” she admitted. “City of Brotherly Love.”

      Logan nearly missed her subtle change of tone. She’d seemed so cheerful earlier, yesterday, too, and even at dinner last night. He didn’t want to see that other look in her eyes or hear the trembling words that spoke of some deep hurt. He had enough troubles of his own and all the responsibility he could handle.

      She took a breath. “The farther west I travel, the more...open I feel. Less closed in somehow.”

      He couldn’t help but smile. “That’s how I feel when I’m flying.”

      “You’re a pilot?”

      “Private jets. Experimental sometimes—but mostly redesigns.” Until he got his promotion. Then his assignments would become way more interesting.

      “A test pilot,” she said. “No wonder you don’t seem that happy to be here.”

      He looked outside the barn at that big blue sky. “Got me,” he said.

      “I think I know how you feel. Flying high must seem like being a bird. I suppose if I reached California, I’d feel positively free.” She didn’t sound that convinced. “Or maybe,” she added with that look again, “I’ll just run out of road.”

      He didn’t want to care, but still he had to ask.

      “Blossom, what are you running from?”

       CHAPTER THREE

      ON HER WAY back to the house, Blossom shook so hard her teeth clacked together. But she forced herself not to run. She could sense Logan staring at her from the barn doorway, but she wouldn’t let him see that he’d frightened her. Reminded her of why she was running.

      She hated feeling afraid.

      There was no need to be scared. She’d finally found a place where she wouldn’t startle awake each night to find herself in yet another cheap motel room. Lying in the dark, listening to the rush of traffic on the road, clutching a musty blanket to her throat, her other hand on her stomach, waiting for that sharp pounding at the flimsy door.

      Mornings had rarely been better. Over breakfast whenever she could afford a meal, Blossom planned the next leg of what she liked to think of as her journey to freedom. In the past month she’d changed cars three times, paying cash so Ken couldn’t track the transaction. Each “bargain” buy had cost less than the last, and she’d bought from people who didn’t worry about such minor things as a title transfer, but she’d kept moving even when she was cold, hungry, out of hope, out of money...and always afraid.

      Shivering in her loose chinos and big shirt, she climbed the back steps to the house. She’d changed her style, too, thrown away the bright clothes she preferred and all the designer labels Ken had bought her. She didn’t want to be noticed anymore like some shiny trophy, didn’t want to be “seen.”

      Then why this heart-pounding sense of alarm now, this leaden feel to her limbs?

      In the kitchen she dropped onto a chair, still cold and shaking and in darkness even though the room was bathed in sunlight. She should be thankful. Today she wasn’t on some back road to avoid the highways, praying her old sedan would make it to the next stop.

      She propped her elbows on the kitchen table, buried her face in her hands. Yet she was afraid and Logan had seen through her.

      And with that, she was back in Philly again in Ken’s condo with the bathroom door lock that didn’t work when she needed it most...remembering all the things she couldn’t seem to do right, no matter how she tried to forget.

      The memories shrieked through her mind like tires on wet pavement, like her life was then, skidding out of control...

      * * *

      “YOU WOULDN’T LAST a day without me.”

      Looming over her, Ken shook a paper in Blossom’s face. Through a tangle of curls she stared up at him, wondering what she’d done this time. Every night before he came home from work, she hurried around the condo, changing the king-size sheets, taking care to make crisp hospital corners that were folded and tucked in just so, as her father and Ken had taught her to do, then checking the pots on his fancy stove to make sure she didn’t let their meal burn or boil over and create another mess.

      “I haven’t done anything!” she insisted.

      “You can’t even remember to pay a parking ticket. This citation was written a month ago—and you hid it in my glove compartment!”

      Oh, God. She’d forgotten. She’d borrowed Ken’s car while hers was at the Lexus dealer’s to be washed and waxed. She’d gone to a doctor’s appointment, which he didn’t know about. Ever since she’d used the home pregnancy-test kit, Blossom couldn’t seem to find the right time to tell him.

      “Ken, I’ll pay it tomorrow.”

      “Do you know how important I am in this burg? You’ll pay it now! Before word gets around that I’m engaged to a scatterbrain.”

      Blossom frowned. Who would tell anyone about the ticket but him? But then, as he’d said often enough, Ken did have a reputation to safeguard. He was a successful real estate developer. He knew everyone—and everyone knew him. It was Blossom